


An Eldritch abomination and his human boyfriend

by IdleNight



Category: Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)
Genre: Eldritch Vanitas, M/M, This Was Supposed To Be A One Shot, and here we are, eldritch au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:15:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 12,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27290314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IdleNight/pseuds/IdleNight
Summary: Vanitas ends up in the body of a human baby in an attempt to escape being eaten by the Hunter. Losing most of his memories of his time as an unimaginable horror from another dimension he is stuck growing up in this human body.It's not all bad.The family he ended up with is kind and he even finds love, an unfamiliar concept to him.But the Hunter always finds its prey
Relationships: Vanitas/Ventus (Kingdom Hearts)
Comments: 17
Kudos: 30





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The first few chapters are heavily based (ngl a little stolen) on a choose your own adventure game made on choice of games called The Passenger, its still a wip but you can play the alpha demo! I recommend it

So this is how it ends. The Hunter, the creature. All sounds, all color, it uses all its mouths, all thirteen of them, as it taunts him. Its infinite yellow eyes glow menacingly and all are trained on him as he crawls away desperately. One of its many arms swipes at his form, somehow he manages to see this coming and quickly moves out of the way. Trying to scramble up to run away properly.

He needed to get out of here. A different dimension might throw the Hunter off his trail, but for how long? It's been following him how long? 

But nothing ever lasts, not even eternity. He should know: he’s been a part of it since always and forever. He has seen everything, has heard so much, and has feasted and feasted and feasted.

Being feasted upon.

The Hunter will now feast upon his carcass, so it is, so it will always be. There will come a being that will eventually feast upon the Hunter. Although that thought didn’t seem likely as he was desperately trying to hide from the other creature.

Fear racked through his many limbs, swirling and twisting into each other as his many organs were pumping rapidly, trying to heal the bits and pieces that were already consumed.

What could he do?

He heard the disgusting screech of the Hunter, it was close and coming closer still. Yet he waited, still. A plan formulating in his head.

When the eternal yellow glowing eyes were trained upon him once again he dodged the several limbs grabbing at his ever-shifting form and slithered away. Even injured, he was faster than the giant form of the Hunter. 

It seems confused, it was not expecting his movement to be this fluid that, he was sure of. It grabs at nothing and its screech reverberates through his being. He shuddered.

He takes its confusion and uses it to his advantage. He slides, and jumps dimensions, neither knowing nor caring where the destination will be.

This isn’t how he does things, running away isn’t his style. He’s falling without any control phasing through different universes at the speed of light. His whole being collapses in on itself, he moves some tendrils through the space he’s falling in, searching and searching.

It takes some time but he finds what he’s looking for. He leaped forward without thinking anymore, slipping himself through a rift blinking out of existence.

_ Small. _

This dimension is tiny, crowded. But it’s too late to go back now and trying to slip through another dimension would mean the Hunter could catch up. Not that he had much of a choice as he can feel himself fading away. The dimension knows he’s an outsider, knows he shouldn’t be here and it’s trying to pull him apart as the Hunter had tried.

With a pang of horror, he realizes he was losing himself. Not just his form and essence, but his omniscient awareness.

His  _ name,  _ He can’t remember  _ his name. _

The dimension pulls harder, his essence writhes in pain and he howls. Both in anger and in agony. Quickly trying to search around for  _ something _ that can stop this  _ pain _ .

A thought, a mind, reaches out to him completely by accident. He latches on to it desperately and feels it  _ snap _ under his essence and immensity of his being. He howled in anger, the dimension trying to get rid of him with more urgency. He couldn’t die  _ now _ , he managed to get away from the Hunter and he would  _ survive _ . 

And that might become true.

He senses two more twines of thought. One seems to be panicking, terrified, and confused. He doesn’t care about that one, it would try to make sense of him like the first one had and it would break. The other one is more interesting, it’s blank and soft and stupid, stupid, stupid enough to allow him to crawl into its mind.

And he does, he swirls in there with his last ounce of energy as his essence spins in on itself to fit and slither in the feeble mind of this creature. It doesn’t respond in any way, shape or form. Its mind a serene nothingness as he closes off his own mind once he’s sure all of his essence that was left has entered the creature. Hoping this wouldn’t be the last time he would be conscious. 

  
  


It doesn’t last long, he’s ripped from the sleep he forced upon himself by the shifting environment. Wet became dry, warm became cold. There’s a bright light, blinding him and things touching all over his body, holding him and  _ pulling _ at him.

He screams.

That’s not quite right. The body he inhabits screams. It sounds awful. What kind of casket did he drag himself  _ into _ ?

Everything is blurry and bright, noises all around him, they were speaking? If so it was some kind of primitive language he couldn’t wrap his exhausted brain around.

They were repeating words, something about the casket?

“It’s a boy, the baby is a boy!”

A baby boy. He wasn’t sure what it meant and it wasn’t important to him. What was important is what he had gotten himself into. A larva from the species of this dimension? What was he supposed to do with this thing? He couldn’t even move the casket's limbs properly.

His casket gets pushed around, clumsily dried off with something itchy, and shoved against a warm body. He craves the touch, no, the  _ baby _ does. He desperately wishes he could shut off his senses again. He would rest, get better and when he has regained his strength he would leave this casket and horrid dimension behind, it would be a bad dream.

-0-

When the casket woke again much later to find another creature staring down at him. He couldn’t make out any features as the creature seemed to be a big blur, but he doubted that was what it actually looked like. The casket's eyesight seemed to be terribly blurry.

The blurry beast said something in that primitive language he still had trouble understanding. He just stared back at the beast, awaiting its action. It pokes at him with its finger and if it weren’t for the useless body of this casket he would have shown this lesser creature exactly what he thought about its actions. He already missed the days he could swallow stars whole.

He tries to use the casket arms to reach out to the beast and grab at its fingers. He managed to actually hold on to one of them, the casket made some kind of noise at his satisfied response. The beast seemed to enjoy the sound and moved its finger around, the caskets grip quickly loosening out of it.

For a moment, the beast leaned in closer. Good, almost in biting range. It looked up just as suddenly at something else and blabbered out something the casket couldn’t hear. When the beast turned back to stare at him it screamed loudly instead. 

He, no, the  _ casket _ , had soiled itself. This dimension was just getting better and better.

Another taller figure comes into view and is just as blurry as the other beast. He recognizes it as the warm body from before and the craving for its warmth comes back. Why was his casket so attached to this creature? It comes closer and takes his casket out of his soft prison.

It coos at him as it lays him somewhere else, removing the things wrapped around his casket's body and cleans him up. It’s talking to him and he can make out some of the words, it seems to just be talking about him as the taller beast called it ‘accident.’ so he was content with tuning it out.

The beast wrapped him up again after cleaning and held him to its chest. The casket reacted favorably to the contact and made noises on its own. He couldn’t bring himself to mind the contact of this particular creature much. It was very gentle.

“All clean now aren’t we, my little Vanitas?” It said as it rocked his casket softly up and down in its warm embrace.

Vanitas? Was that the name of his casket?”

It wasn’t like he could remember his true name, Vanitas would do.


	2. Toys

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanitas age 2 / Sora age 4

His casket is stuck in a box with bars, he’s sitting on some soft mat and there are a collection of toys in front of him. He has figured out he was expected to  _ play _ with these things but has yet to figure out the purpose of it. Vanitas ponders on the toys for a while until he hears a short creature approaching him. 

“Hey,” The creature speaks. Its name is Sora, and it is the casket's  _ brother _ . It’s a weird concept that means that both of them were squeezed out by the same creature:  _ mom _ , the tall beast that feeds, cleans and sings to his casket. The one his casket craves attention from.

Sora climbs over the fence and sits in front of him. Vanitas stares at it while the creature smiles at him, it does that a lot. The creature suddenly grabs one of the toys in front of him, it is the soft one that is meant to resemble some other lesser creature from this dimension. Sora holds it up in front of his face, hiding behind it, only to suddenly move it away from his face. 

“Peek a boo!” Sora says, one of its more exaggerated smiles on its face that Vanitas has learned was supposed to be funny. Vanitas just stared at it, refusing to respond to the antics of the creature. Sora sighed, somewhat used to this routine by now.

“Why don’t you ever want to play, aren’t you bored?” Vanitas could admit he was bored or annoyed most of the time, his essence wasn’t building up as fast as he had hoped so it seemed he would be stuck here for a while. He figured trying wouldn’t hurt. Vanitas thankfully had more control over his casket body by now, and it had grown teeth, he had been  _ very _ excited about that. He reached the casket's chubby arm out to the toy the creature was holding. Its eyes widened and his grin returned at the motion, Sora handed him the plush toy. 

Vanitas looked at it, he thought it resembled the bunnies he had seen on one of those programs the casket's mother would put on and force him to watch. They were tiresome but it helped to teach him the primitive language, the casket's brain seemed to be too small to fully comprehend everything yet but it had been getting better and he could now understand most things as well as speak, even if he didn’t respond often. 

He held onto the plush toy with both of the casket stubby hands and decided he would put his teeth to use again, shoving the toy's head in the mouth of the casket, biting down as hard as the casket's weak jaw allowed him to.

“That’s a way to play I guess?” The casket's brother said a confused expression on its face. Sora tried to grab and pull the toy out of his mouth so Vanitas bit his hand instead. 

The creature made a noise of surprise, it wasn’t screaming though so his weak jaw couldn’t bite through skin yet. Disappointing.

“You really like biting things don’t you?” Sora was giggling, removing its hand from the casket's mouth without much of a struggle. Vanitas was annoyed at this, his casket likely imitated this on its face because Sora petted his hair. “That’s ok, just don’t try to bite people, that’s rude.” He would bite as many people as he pleased the second his caskets jaw and teeth would be stronger.


	3. Kindergarten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanitas age 4 / Sora age 6

He has been stuck in this casket for four years now, years being how the dominant species of this dimension, the ‘humans’, perceive time. Vanitas is the name of his casket, he has gotten used to referring himself as such over the years. He has gotten a better grasp of the primitive language as well as the body of the casket. But regaining his energy and essence was a slow process, in fact, there was barely any process.

The caskets' so-called ‘mother’ had abandoned him in something they called a daycare. Vanitas hated this place. The other human children were exceptionally loud and liked to push and pull on his casket's body. You’d think he’d be used to it by now with the caskets so-called ‘brother’, Sora, being loud and touchy himself. But Sora was just one human child, these were ten human children all doing these things simultaneously. 

When yet another human child wrapped his arms around him, as Sora and Mom would do, Vanitas had decided that he had enough. These lesser life forms needed to be made aware that even while stuck in a useless human body in this terrible dimension, he was not to be trifled with.

Vanitas bit down in the human child's shoulder, a little closer to the neck, not to kill, just a warning. The child screamed and let its arms that were constricting Vanitas fall, but he wasn’t done with the human quite yet, as he clamped his jaw down harder feeling the child struggle against him. He could taste something irony and wet, good.

He was ripped away by the taller human overseers of the daycare. Vanitas growled at it and he could feel the liquid from the other human child dripping off the caskets chin, which felt satisfying, while he was aware human on human consumption was frowned upon if the shows the caskets mother watched where any indication it still felt good, he had felt a glimmer of what it used to feel like to consume and rip apart other entities like himself. Vanitas made a move to bite at the overseers as well but they constricted him in their arms in such a way he couldn’t reach their skin easily. He opted for screaming and wiggling out of their grasp instead.

Later, Vanitas's mouth was forcefully cleaned with a cloth and he was locked inside a room away from the other children. The overseers had told him they would call his mother and the other child had been taken to a hospital. He didn’t care about any of that, in fact, he was pretty satisfied with himself, all the little humans had seemed too scared to even look at him, that was good progress.

The door was thrown open as his mother arrived, she ran towards him and kneeled in front of him where he was sitting, her soft warm hands placed on his cheeks as she tried to see if there was anything wrong. His mother was always overly concerned about his casket's health, every time he accidentally fell she would come running and would not stop fretting for half an hour, It was exhausting. On the other hand, Vanitas didn’t mind the warm hands, every time the human touched him his casket felt a wave of calm which was oddly pleasant, he leaned his face into the hand and closed his eyes for a second as he basked in the comfort.

The overseers came in after her and closed the door behind them. His mother gave the casket a kiss on his forehead and said to stay put. Fine.

The three of them stood close to the door in the corner, but Vanitas could hear every word they said.

“He fights and bites his older brother when they play, but he has never actually bit down hard enough to bleed so much.” The casket's mother said hushed, glancing at Vanitas with concern in her eyes. Vanitas just stared back. She glanced away just as quickly. 

“Vanitas is extremely anti-social as well as uncomfortable with touch and after this outburst, we think he might have some sort of disorder.” One of the overseers told his mother who looked even more concerned when they said this. The other nodded and continued. “We recommend getting him checked, and would also ask to find another day-care as we can’t guarantee the safety of the other children as well as Vanitas if he stays here.”


	4. A new addition

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanitas 5 / Sora 7

Mom has been bloated for a while.

Apparently, this meant that she was ‘pregnant’ and she would push out another human larvae soon. Vanitas remembered his exhausting days as a larva, it was terrible enough to be one and he wasn’t looking forward to dealing with one that was beyond his control. At least with his casket, he could just tune out at first and the body would be on a kind of ‘auto-pilot’.

Sora had wondered how Mom had gotten pregnant as he said that ‘Dad was in heaven’. Vanitas wasn’t exactly sure yet what a ‘Heaven’ was but he was aware of what a father was, he saw them picking up other children at the Kindergarten.

Mom seemed uncomfortable and said something about the larva being a gift from ‘god’. Vanitas also wasn’t sure yet who ‘god’ was but he wondered how this creature had shoved a human larva inside Mom without either him or Sora knowing how.

That is why Sora and him were sitting in the hospital, waiting with their ‘Grandmother’ outside of the room where their mother was currently pushing out the larvae. Vanitas wondered if it was like this when Mom pushed out his casket. Sora was playing a game on its Gameboy, it was humming some annoying tune from the game. He tried to tune it out as he stared mindlessly in front of him.

At long last, a nurse came through the door and motioned for them to come inside. Sora was the first, the beast shoving the Gameboy in its pocket quickly and running through the door. The casket's Grandma stood up calmly and held out its hand for him to take. While Vanitas hated being dragged around he took it anyway. He had learned quickly that Grandma is higher in the hierarchy than Mom and that it can be troublesome to deal with when angered. Also, Vanitas got more treats than his brother from Grandma for being good and that was incentive enough.

Mom was sweaty and looked red, her stomach wasn’t as bloated anymore and she held an ugly looking thing to her chest. It was wrapped in cloth but he could clearly make out its ugly face and the mop of black hair. Sora had already climbed on the bed, and before he could do anything Grandma picked him up and put him on the other side of the bed next to Mom.

“Sora, Vanitas, this is your little sister, Xion.” Mom said, she sounded exhausted but looked joyfully and the ugly larvae. 

Sora got to hold it first, it was surprisingly careful with it. Obviously, it had done so before when holding Vanitas as larvae. It cooed at the larvae just as Sora had often done with Vanitas. Eventually, Mom took the larvae back in her arms before passing it on to him.

Xion was then carefully put in the small arms of his casket, his arms were moved to properly support the larvae's weak neck and head. Vanitas stared at it with wide eyes. The larvae's eyes were closed, but it seemed to turn its head towards him anyway. Odd.

The longer Vanitas stared at the larvae the less ugly it looked. As it made a noise and weakly grabbed at his shirt he could feel the heart of his casket doing something funny. 

Vanitas swore he would protect this little larva, Xion, with all he was.


	5. Hands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanitas (almost) 6 / Sora 8 / Xion 5 months

Vanitas his casket is sitting in class, this is his first year of Elementary School. He is seated at a table with other children and they are supposed to listen to the adult human standing in front of a large board. It’s explaining something but Vanitas drowns it out.

His casket is growing up fast, at least that’s what Mom says. He’ll have to take its word for it, since to him, he was still a soft helpless creature that could be picked up and eaten at any point.

Vanitas looks at his casket’s hands and counts to six. That’s the number of human years he’s spent here now and it makes him want to tear out the casket's hair and scream in frustration. Is his energy returning or building up at all?

_He isn’t sure._

_It makes him angry._

The casket's hands are still in his vision. Vanitas doesn’t think, he just acts. He puts those fingers inside the casket’s mouth and bites down hard. There’s pain, lots of it, but there’s also release, sweet release.

By the time Mister Lauriam sees what he’s doing, Vanitas is tasting blood and has lost a sense of touch in one of his fingers. The first thing it tries to do is pull his hand out his mouth and by the strong metallic taste that soaks against his casket's tongue, Vanitas would bet that it was a bad idea.

The color drains from Mister Lauriam’s face and it tries to pry Vanitas's mouth open with its fingers mumbling pleading words to get him to comply. Instead, Vanitas lets out a low rumble echoing in his chest as an answer. It doesn’t stop prying his mouth open, so Vanitas attacks its finger instead.

Vanitas might be inside a soft lump of flesh and brittle bones but his reflexes are as sharp as ever. He lets go of his own bloody hand and bites down into Mister Lauriam’s. It screams in pain and in surprise smacks him in the face. The creature manages to land a lucky hit on his casket's nose and he stumbles back, dazed. The distraction is enough for Mister Lauriam to escape his maw.

The look of sheer horror on its face, as well as that of the children in the classroom makes Vanitas feel a lot better.

Some of the tiny humans have started to scream, Mister Lauriam staggers back, torn between trying to help the screaming children and what to do about his assailant. Vanitas contorts the face of his casket in a grin, he can feel his own blood as well as that of Mister Lauriam’s on his teeth and drip down his chin.

That seemed to bring Mister Lauriam to a decision as he fled the classroom, some kids quickly following after him. The human larvae that remained stared at him. 

Vanitas could probably have some fun with this. 

He used the caskets legs to launch himself at one of the children, immediately snapping his jaw shut on the first bit of skin he got, the child’s cheek. It screamed and struggled to throw him off but before he could retaliate or break skin he was pulled off and held up in the air by someone way taller and stronger than a human child. Vanitas screamed and kicked in hopes to get free but it was futile. The larger human carried him away in silence as he screamed until the casket's throat felt too raw to continue soon enough he found himself restrained on a stretcher.

-0-

Vanitas had to spend three nights in the hospital after that. The casket's fingers had been almost severed off from its hand, and the creatures wanted to make sure he wouldn’t try and do anything like it again.

A lot of those beasts came by and asked him enough questions to get his head spinning almost as much as it had when he was biting off the casket's fingers. When they had asked too many questions Vanitas covered his casket's ears and started screaming its lungs off.

Mom entered the room and pleaded with the beasts to let him be. They were reluctant, he had a history of violence and biting after all. He would be sent to a ‘therapist’ whatever that was.

Now though Vanitas was back home again, watching Sora play video games on the screen in the living room. His casket's hand felt itchy, but he wasn’t allowed to scratch it, not with the bandages on. Sora told him it… _He,_ Vanitas has to remind himself, because Sora doesn’t like it when he calls him _It_. Sora was expecting Vanitas to come back wearing a cast and seemed to be disappointed and sad he wasn’t.

“I was going to draw stars on it!” He told Vanitas. “Or a shark with big pointy teeth. I thought it would’ve been funny, right Jaws?”

Vanitas looks away from the TV at Sora. “Jaws?”

“Yeah cause you like biting and stuff.” Sora smiled at him but quickly returned his attention to the game. So far he was the only one that hadn’t been uneasy about Vanitas almost biting his caskets fingers off. Then again, Sora has been exposed to his behavior for years now. Vanitas looked back at the TV in time to see Sora miss a platform and watch the character fall to its death. Sora groaned and fell on his back, dropping the controller. Vanitas made to grab for the controller, but Sora quickly held it outside of the range of his casket's short arms. 

“Hey, what do we say when we want to use something that isn’t ours?” Sora repeated what Mom would often say. Vanitas sighed loudly, he hated this pleasantry game.

“May I _please_ have the controller?” the casket's brother smiled and handed Vanitas what he wanted. He pressed play and continued the level where Sora had died.

Sora let him play for a while before speaking up. “It’s almost your birthday.” he hummed in response, not particularly committed to this conversation topic. “Although we’re probably celebrating it a few days later as usual.”

“Why do we?” Vanitas squinted at the TV screen as he made a particularly annoying jump. He had always wondered why they never celebrated his casket's birthday on the day itself, they did with Sora and Mom. Vanitas didn’t really care for the act of a birthday itself but it was something Mom and Sora cared for so it was curious.

“Because… well because dad died on your birthday.” Sora was quiet as he said it, finally sitting upright. Dad? Vanitas wasn’t aware they had a father at all.

“I thought we didn’t have a dad.”

“Of course we have one silly.” 

“Where is it?”

“ _He_ , Jaws, Dad’s a _he,_ not an it.” He looked away uncomfortably. Vanitas pauses the game to look at Sora. “He’s in heaven, mom said he died of a... uh, a see-sure.” Sora glances at the archway to the kitchen where Mom is feeding Xion and continues in a softer tone. “He died on the same night you were born, actually. It’s a sad day so we celebrate your birthday a bit later.” Vanitas just hums in response, eyes glancing back to the TV where the game is still paused. “Did someone say anything about it?” Sora sounded concerned.

“No.” Vanitas pressed play again and gave the controller back to Sora who gleefully took it, forgetting about the conversation. As Vanitas watched him play he was thinking. _Dads_ come to pick their kids up in Kindergarten and at Elementary sometimes. Giving it some more thought, he guessed he was responsible for Sora and his casket's father’s death that night. When a mind had snapped under the weight of his essence, this casket's mind had been so close, it must have been right when it was born. His meddling caused this family one of their pillars.

He looked at one of the photographs on the wall next to the TV, it was of a taller human man with brown hair, just like his brother, holding a smaller Sora while they were playing in the snow.

Vanitas had killed Sora’s dad. He hadn’t meant to, but he did.

The stomach of his Casket felt weird at this thought. _Guilt_.


	6. Ice cream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanitas 10 / Sora 12 / Xion 5

Vanitas didn’t have a lot of friends.

This wasn’t something odd, he was the ‘weird’ kid after all. Everyone in Daybreak Elementary was aware of the stunts he pulled on his very first school day, he had the teeth shaped scars to prove it. Kids avoided him like the plague and he was fine with that, being left alone was easier than forcing himself to deal with them anyway. 

His therapist, Miss Invi, had asked him if this bothered him. He had said no, human children are annoying and a distraction. Miss Invi made him go trough stupid exercises to practice making ‘friends’ anyway.

Sora had a lot of friends.

Too many in fact.

They were often over to play at their house, none of them liked Vanitas and he was ok with that, the feeling was mutual. Sometimes they would be forced to play with him because Sora liked him for whatever reason.

Sora’s oldest friend, a silver haired boy named Riku, was mostly indifferent to him and tolerated him at best. Vanitas could respect Riku, he was the only one out of Sora’s friends he could put up with.

Today however he had to put up with Sora’s entire friend group.

Mom was too busy at the flower shop and couldn’t pick Vanitas up from school so Sora, who had recently entered Junior High and was therefore old enough to be allowed to go to and from school by himself, had to pick him up and babysit him. Xion had apparently not been invited and instead was picked up by their grandmother.

Vanitas sat in the ice cream shop Sora and his friends dragged him to. Luckily he was seated in the corner next to the window so he could easily avoid the annoying faces of Sora’s friends as he slowly licked at his sea salt ice cream and watched the people outside the ice cream shop.

A motion from the child in front of him pulls him out of his thoughts. He looks at Roxas… or was it Ventus? The two human children look exactly the same, ‘twins’ as Sora called them. Either way, the blonde child meets his eyes, gives a small wave and then looks away quickly, face becoming red. Vanitas frowns at this but lets it go continuing slowly licking at his ice cream and zoning out. Humans are odd.

Another movement from Ventus/Roxas. But not in his field of vision, no the human boy kicks him in the shins. Vanitas his eyes snap to the boy, he seems to look apologetic about his actions, which means very little to him, he growls at the kid and kicks back in retaliation.

He misses. Sora sees it anyway.

“Jaws!” He sighed deeply, acknowledging Vanitas as the nuisance he is. “Don’t kick Ventus.” Not Roxas then.

Vanitas frowned at his brother. “He started it.” Sora’s eyes were full of doubt.

“I-uh yeah sorry that was my fault.” Ventus spoke up. He looked shyly down at his dripping ice cream. “I wasn’t sure how to get his attention.” The boy blushed almost impossibly deeper as he said that.

“Oh then it’s ok!” Sora chirped happily and immediately turned his back to them continuing his conversation with Riku and Roxas.

Vanitas and Ventus stared at each other for a while. Correction, Vanitas stared at Ventus while the latter kept quickly glancing at him and fidgeting with the melting ice cream in his hand.

“Eat your ice cream.”

“Huh?” Came the intelligent reply from the blonde.

“If you can’t notice your ice cream melting on your hands while staring at it you must be really pathetic, even for a human.” Vanitas rolled his eyes, biting the last bit of ice cream from the stick before turning his attention back to the people passing the window.

“You’re saying that like you aren’t.” Ventus replied after a minute of silence between the two of them.

“Aren’t what?”

“Human.”

Vanitas snorted at that, tearing his eyes away from the window again. “I’m not.”

“I know they call you weird and insane but you seem pretty nice to me.” Ventus blushed as he called him a nice human. Why was this kid overheating the whole time? Vanitas wasn’t aware humans could be this constantly embarrassed.

“Why would you think that, did Sora tell you that?” He accusingly pointed at the blonde with his ice cream stick. “Sora has to be nice to me otherwise Mom gets mad, you shouldn’t listen to him.”

“Sora likes you!” Everybody was always so quick to defend his brother, even if he was lying. “We’re in the same class actually, you seem nice.” Ventus quickly avoided eye contact and shoved the melting ice cream in his mouth as if to prevent himself from speaking further. Vanitas always thought Roxas was in the same class as him. Guess the teachers even manage to confuse the twins.

“You don’t know me.” Nobody did actually, not really. Vanitas considered telling Miss Invi sometimes, he wondered how the therapist would react, maybe she would finally diagnose him as ‘clinically insane’. Although he had noticed he had become more passive in his human body over the years, he was losing his edge but the threat of actually being sent to some mental hospital like kids at school joked about was terrifying to Vanitas.

“I’d like to know you.” The boy's face looked genuine. His green eyes wide, a small smile on his round face that was littered with freckles.

Vanitas probably looked dumb, mouth and eyes wide open as he stared at Ventus. Luckily, he quickly recovered from this embarrassing blunder. “Tsk, are you stupid?”

“According to my report card? Yes.” The blonde boy had put it so simple and matter of fact that Vanitas actually laughed out loud at it, shoulders shaking heavily as he fought for breath against his own body. His laughter died down after twenty seconds of solid laughing and was met with silence around the table. All five humans looked at him surprised. Oh.

Vanitas felt warmth spread from his neck to his face. Oh no.

This time he was the one blushing deeply.

“Wow Sora, I didn’t know your little brother had more emotions than anger and annoyance.” The red haired girl (Karin or something) said after the uncomfortable silence dragged on a little long, it seemed to break whatever tension his blunder had created as all of Sora’s friends laughed at the comment. Sora just grinned and bumped shoulders with Vanitas, who in turn just scowled at the table. 

Vanitas didn’t see it, in fact nobody at the table noticed it, but Ventus was looking at Vanitas like he hung the moon in the sky after he burst out laughing, hands sticky from the forgotten ice cream.

When Ventus thought back on this day later in his life, he could pinpoint this exact moment as the day he began falling in love with Vanitas.


	7. Sleepovers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanitas 14 / Sora 16 / Xion 9 / Ventus 15

Ventus had proven himself hard to get rid of.

Ever since the day in the ice cream shop Ventus had glued himself to his side, no matter what stupid stunts Vanitas pulled or dragged Ventus into, the kid wouldn’t stop following around not even scaring or biting seemed to push the boy away. Miss Invi was proud of him for making a friend, Vanitas begrudgingly accepted this fact at first. Now he was mildly content.

Mom absolutely adored Ventus, she always invited him for dinner and insisted Vanitas go over Ventus’ house for dinner. Sleepovers were commonplace as well. He on the other hand made Ventus his parents uneasy and his mother, Aqua, especially. Roxas was mostly indifferent to his twin's weird friend, but Vanitas and him got along decently.

It was one of the sleepovers at his place this time around.

The four of them lived in a small apartment above Mom’s flower shop and while he usually shared his room with his little sister, during sleepovers Xion was sometimes banned to Sora’s room but not tonight. 

Ventus had draped himself over Vanitas, his legs on the bed while his little sister was currently residing on the extra mattress placed on the ground that Ventus would be sleeping on tonight. All three of them held a DS in their hand as they played Mario Kart together. The only sounds being soft exclamations of joy or annoyance and a cd of Katy Perry softly playing in the background (the cd belonged to Xion, that Vanitas thought the music was ok was a coincidence).

It was moments like this Vanitas realized that he didn’t mind being a human that much. While it was exhausting to be so weak all the time, humans could make themselves stronger. Mom, even though paranoid about his health, had allowed him to participate in sports especially when Miss Invi suggested it might help with his anger. He had been allowed to do track and very recently he had convinced his mother to let him start boxing. Ventus had even joined him on track. 

Vanitas felt a smile forming on his face when he thought about his friend and quickly corrected his expression. It was still difficult to accept caring about humans that weren’t in his ‘pack’ so to speak. He respected Mom, Sora was annoying but ultimately would do anything for him and Xion was just as much of a trouble child as he was often described to be, he was very proud in guiding her with that.

Actually caring for Ventus, and not just begrudgingly accepting his existence was new, he wasn’t sure how to feel about it yet. Sure the boy was fun to mess around with and for whatever reason seemed to genuinely like being around him but Vanitas still had trouble with the weird feeling his chest would create whenever Ventus did something or casually touched him like he had been doing for years now.

A loud woop and an elbow in his side was what pulled him out of his thoughts. 

“Oh! Sorry Vani are you okay?” Ventus awkwardly sat up from his sprawled position on Vanitas' legs.

“I’ll live, just be glad Mom didn’t see it, she would kill you for hurting me.” He glanced back at his DS, the round was over and he had ended up in last place thanks to his daydreaming. Ventus was in first place, probably what the pain inducing excitement was about.   
  


“Mom loves Ventus more than you.” Xion piped up from her position on the other mattress, not even looking away from her DS, Vanitas stuck out his tongue anyway, his friend snorting from beside him.

“Get off.” Vanitas started pushing Ventus’ legs of his own but the blonde quickly wrapped his arms around the ravens waist as a way to hang on.

“Nooo, don’t separate us I love you!” The wailing was obviously fake and Vanitas happened to be immune to any kind of puppy eyes anyway, you can thank his little sister for that. He just stared at the boy without any feeling, their contest dragged on for a while.

“Ok this is getting weird I’m going to Sora’s room.” Xion said while already halfway to the door, Vanitas hadn't even noticed his little sister getting up in the first place. 

“Oh guess that’s it for Mario Kart tonight.” Ventus still clung to his waist, in fact he seemed to hold on tighter. 

“Stop using me as your pillow and sit up.” the blonde cocked his head to the side and looked at Vanitas with his eyes squinted. 

“Or else what?” 

Vanitas didn’t bother to explain and instead to demonstrate why this dumb human should listen to him. He shot his knee upward, It was a simple movement but very effective as he hit Ventus in the stomach. The boy let out a surprised noise and groaned loudly, rolling off Vanitas and on his own side with one hand holding his stomach.

“Ugh why are you such an asshole.”

“I told you from the beginning but you’re not good at listening now are you.” Vanitas patted the blonde's hair in a mock of comfort. 

“Yea and we also established I’m an idiot.”

“You sure are.”

Ventus sat up, stretching his back far enough that they could both hear it pop (Vanitas winced at the sound, human bodies where fragile and stupid) before letting his arms fall back down to his sides, probably too close for most humans to deem acceptable. Legs firmly pressed together and hands almost touching. Vanitas was used to it when it came to the blonde.

Vanitas stared at Ventus's hand and eventually grabbed it with his own. The boy let out a small gasp as he did but the raven didn’t pay it any mind. Turning the blonde’s hand around on his own, looking at it with a fascinated expression on his face. Ventus was truly covered in freckles everywhere and his hands seemed small and soft while the hands of his casket had already become a little rougher even if he has only been boxing for a few months now. Human bodies were fragile but could be oddly beautiful.

“Uhm, Vani?” Ventus's voice sounded odd so Vanitas looked up at his friend.

Their faces were pretty close.

Maybe a little too close.

His eyes looked over the face of his friend, Ventus’ lower lip was trembling and his freckled face was extremely red. Why was Ventus embarrassed at their joined hands? He never had a problem grabbing his hand before, how was this different?

That question was partly answered when Ventus suddenly surged forward and smashed their faces together. He was of course aware of what this was, ‘Kissing’, although he had never experienced it before, Vanitas was sure that it was supposed to be more gentle than that. 

It was also over before he could really process the thought of how he could make that go smoother. Ventus looked mortified as he pulled away and seemed like he was about to apologize. Vanitas was determined to do this properly now though, he didn’t half ass things. He let go of Ventus’ hand and instead placed it on the back of his neck and pulled his friend closer to his own face.

Their lips met again softly this time, Ventus’ mouth slightly agape, Vanitas could feel the blondes' breath glide across his lips as well as the soft tremble in Vens own. Now this was way nicer than whatever Ventus just tried doing. One small kiss turned into two as they kept meeting again and again for soft pecks.

When they finally parted Ventus looked redder than Vanitas has ever seen him before, and that was saying a lot. He looked a little dumb with his eyes half closed and mouth still hanging open like his brain hasn't quite caught up yet. Vanitas his snort seemed to bring him back to the here and now however.

“We… uh, we really just did that huh?” The blonde was impossibly red.

“You started it.” 

“I didn’t expect you to.. ehm.. to kiss back.” Vanitas shrugged uncommittedly. He liked Ventus, he wasn’t sure if it was what those weird teenage drama shows called ‘love’ but Ventus was the only human outside of his family he felt comfortable around. 

“Can we do it again?” Ventus asked looking down, avoiding his eyes, hands fiddling with the strings on his hoodie. 

“Sure, just don’t break my teeth this time.” Ventus smiled shyly as he slowly leaned back in. The second time was just as nice as the first time.

Until it wasn’t.

A headache.

He’s had them before of course, there was a reason Mom was so worried about his health and well being. Vanitas had been a weak child and his casket got sick easily. But they’ve never been like this. 

It felt like a crowbar had been lodged between his eye sockets. The pain was so sharp that he doubled over, he vaguely registered falling into Ventus and thought the other boy was saying something but it was drowned out by the strangled cry Vanitas let out. He tried to stand up and go to Mom for help but collapsed instantly, the only reason he didn't crumple on the floor like the miserable sack of shit he felt like was Ventus catching him around his waist and carefully putting him back down to on the bed. Vanitas felt hands cupping his face but his vision was swimming. It was difficult to see Ventus right in front of him as anything but a blur.

“Vani, you’re bleeding!” Ventus sounded panicked but it was only vaguely registered, he did feel something leak from his nose and wiped at it, he couldn’t see it clearly but there was a lot of red on his hand when it came back.

Everything after that was a blur.

Mom was scared. She thought Danny had passed whatever brain anomaly he had onto him. Of course she wasn’t aware  _ Vanitas _ had been the brain anomaly.

The scans in the hospital later that night said that he was a completely healthy teenager. 

Ventus had stayed with him as long as he could, squeezing Vanitas’ scarred hand the whole time, Vanitas caught him tearing up several times. He tried to reassure his friend (boyfriend? normal friends didn’t kiss, he was pretty sure) but eventually Terra came to pick him up. Ventus was hesitant to leave but seemed finally reassured, or at least distracted enough to be pulled away by his adoptive father, when Vanitas had pulled him in for a quick kiss. Which earned a gasp from Terra and his Mom, Sora had whistled and he swore he had heard Xion whisper “Finally”.

So he was a completely healthy teenager according to the doctors. 

Then why did the headaches keep coming back?

The doctors weren’t sure, even after a dozen more headscans. They eventually settled on calling it ‘Episodic Migraines’. Which was great except for the fact where they leave him blind and curled up in a pathetic ball of suffering. But hey now at least he knew what to tell strangers who asked if he was alright.

His mother had been even more concerned for his health and pulled him off his sports for the time being, leaving him feeling more miserable and even less in control of this stupid human body. At least he got to spend the time he would use in sports with his now boyfriend.


	8. Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanitas 14 / Sora 16 / Xion 9 / Ventus 15

Ventus kicked his shins.

Vanitas just glared at his boyfriend who innocently took a sip of his milkshake, his lips pulled in a smug smile around the straw. Bastard.

They were on their 10th official date at ‘Le grand Bistrot’ which was a fancy name for a half decent diner. Now that Mom had pulled Vanitas from most sports he decided to fill the void by spending time with his boyfriend, who was an absolute menace. Proven again when he swung his legs forward again resulting into Vanitas getting kicked in the shin, again.

“Stop it.”

After a long and loud sip Ventus pulled away from his milkshake. “Stop what?” The biggest grin on the blonde's face as he said it.

“Stop trying to get attention with 5 year old pigtail pulling strategies.” 

“What can I say, I like your angry face. It's pretty hot.” Ventus had been getting way more bold with the things he said to Vanitas ever since they started dating 3 months ago.

His casket's response to this kind of behavior was despicable as well. Vanitas would bet he was as beet red going by the warmth he felt blooming across his cheeks. Stupid body.

“You’re also cute when flustered.” 

“Shut up.” He bit back, like that would stop Ventus. Who was leaning across the table with his elbows on the table and face in both his hands. He looked as smitten as those teenagers in those stupid rom coms Ventus forced him to watch sometimes. It was both embarrassing and oddly endearing.

Their moment was ruined when a suddenly sharp pain began behind Vanitas’ eyes and he could feel himself wince. Ventus immediately moved over to the other side of the boot next to him, softly rubbing his back. He was sure Ventus looked worried, but he had his eyes closed and couldn’t see the furrow in his brow. Vanitas pressed the palms of his hands into his eye sockets, hard enough to distract from the original headache. A loud groan escaped him, followed by a soft hush from Ventus. 

The pain was gone just as suddenly as it came.

Odd, his migraines didn’t usually disappear within a minute.

Vanitas slowly removed his hands from his face, blinking a few times against the sudden light. He frowned as he turned to look at Ventus, his eyesight still adjusting after he had rubbed them so harshly before. 

His boyfriend grabbed his chin and held his head still, Vanitas first though he was trying to kiss him but Ventus just held his head still. He was a bit disappointed.

“Vanitas, your eyes.” 

“What about them?”

“They... Have they always had yellow specks in them?”

It was silent between them while the diner and the rest of the world kept going on around them.

After a few beats Vanitas spoke up: “What the fuck?”

Ventus quickly grabbed for his phone and opened the camera, shoving it in Vanitas’ face. He was met with an unflattering angle and moved Ventus, his hand holding the phone up so he could see his eyes better and not have to look at the under chin of his casket. 

His blue eyes didn’t just have yellow specks in them, there were chunks of yellow sporadically in them, big enough they should have been obvious his entire life. Vanitas glanced his now blue-yellow eyes away from his nervous looking reflection on the phone to his boyfriend who looked just as panicked.

“Vani?” Ventus his voice was pitched high and he sounded afraid. 

And he had every right to be.

Human eyes didn’t just change color, and yellow wasn’t exactly on the spectrum of normal human eye colors. It was however a normal eye color for higher ranking entities like himself. 

Vanitas had recently been feeling some influx in his essence, he was regaining energy after 14 years in this stupid dimension but it had been small and barely there. Hell he had almost dismissed the feeling as just nausea. Not long after the episodic migraines had started and now the eyes of his caskets had splotches of what he assumed to be his true eyes in them. It’s not like he remembered much of what he truly looked like. This was a good thing.

Looking at Ventus however made him rethink that. 

Ventus looked so worried, this human cared so much for him and his casket's heart beat faster at the thought. If his essence was growing, enough that it created painful and inhuman changes that affected his casket, then maybe regaining his essence meant he would tear and destroy this body. It meant he would have to leave Ventus.

“Vanitas, what is going on?”

“I- Ven I don’t know.” Vanitas did know, obviously, but he didn’t want to scare away the one human who actively chose to care for him. He may not remember much from before this dimension but he was sure this feeling of care, of being cared for, was something he had never experienced before in his existence of always and forever.

“Maybe you should go and see a doctor with your mom?” the blonde squeezed Vanitas his hand, his brows furrowed deep.

“Doctors could barely find anything wrong with me last time, it’s not like they’re competent.” Or had any frame of reference for Eldritch Abomination In Human Body.

“What if it’ll affect your eyesight? It might be some weird eye disease.” Vanitas could swear Ventus’ eyes looked glossy, oh fuck his boyfriend was about to cry, he didn’t know how to deal with crying humans and he especially didn’t know how to handle Ventus crying because it sometimes made HIM cry as well, completely involuntary mind you, crying was for the weak.

In an attempt to de-escalate the situation Vanitas pulled Ventus in a hug, cradling the blonde’s head like he knew made Ven feel comfortable. “I’ll go, you can even come if you’re so worried.” He pressed a soft kiss to his boyfriends neck, somewhere right behind his ear. Ventus giggled at the feeling, relaxing a bit in his hold.

“Yeah, ok.”

  
  
  
  


-0-

Turns out the doctors couldn’t find anything, unsurprisingly, giving more unnecessary stress to his Mom. They just said something about it being weird, but after tests they deemed his eyesight was perfectly fine, in fact it was better than the average human. 

Ventus was still worried but eventually, when the yellow had spread to cover the entirety of his eyes a few weeks later, had decided that yellow eyes made Vanitas quote “Look really hot.”. Most of his classmates thought he was just some edgy emo kid that wore colored lenses all the time. 

No more influxes of essence, maybe his theory that this was the human body's reaction to being stuffed to the brim by an eldritch abomination. Maybe this was some kind Eldritch Being in Human Body Puberty?

However, sometimes, after another migraine, that Vanitas would look in the mirror and swore his left eye was missing sometimes. 

No pupil, no sclera.

Just Yellow.

Like his eyes might have looked before.

It reminded him of the Hunters' many eyes.

The eyes that haunted his nightmares.


	9. Spooky Squad

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanitas 17 / Sora 19 / Xion 12 / Venuts 18

Ventus had an obsession with the supernatural.

It wasn’t super weird, considering the people who adopted him used to have a ghost hunting show until a few years back. In fact it was more weird that Roxas wasn’t into the supernatural.

It was a little concerning sometimes, mostly because some of the weird ghost hunting devices Ventus had dug up from the attic for his little youtube channel actually made some noises when pointed at him. 

Vanitas eyes his boyfriend who was tinkering with one of these devices from the blonde’s bed. Ventus was blabbering to the camera in front of him about what the device did. His smile was cute but Vanitas was more focused on the device itself. Ventus would wave the device in his hand around, everytime it was somewhat pointed at him some of the lights vaguely blinked off and on for less than a second.

Vanitas turned his worried glanze away from the blonde and back to his phone, right, he was supposed to be looking at the courses the community college offered. 

Sora had gone to college this year, he managed to get into some big name college together with his not boyfriend Riku. He had even managed to get a scholarship. Vanitas wasn’t that lucky, in fact he has always done pretty poorly in school. Ventus probably could get into some prestigious college but he said he was content here in Radiant Garden. Of course Vanitas knew the blonde didn’t want to leave because of him, he didn’t want to drag Ventus down, they had a fight about it… it wasn’t pretty but they were okay again.

“That’s it for this video, please leave any feedback or recommendations in the comments!” Ventus said in his extra peppy voice. “Stay chill Spook Squad!” he finished and grabbed the camera to turn it off.

“Another successful video?” Vanitas asked, more out of politeness than anything.

“I hope so, the channel has been gaining some popularity but it seems to be stagnating.” Ven absentmindedly fumbled with the camera in his hands. “I’ve been thinking of trying to find any haunted locations close by, maybe shoot some video’s investigating places?”

Vanitas raised his eyebrow and put his phone down. “So that you can get yourself killed?”

“I thought you didn’t believe in ghosts and demons.” Ventus sounded smug as he said it. Vanitas just rolled his eyes. He had no reason to believe in ghosts and demons, humans had active imaginations and he was sure that if something existed he would have picked up its energy at some point.

“No, you’re just a klutz and would probably trip and die on a loose floorboard.”

“Then you should come with me!” His boyfriend was excitedly bouncing up and down in his chair. This was unfair, Ventus was adorable and he had a hard time saying no to him. “You can co-host with me, it would be interesting to have a believer and non-believer duo, that way you have more perspective!” Ventus continued to babble excitedly as he walked over to him and dropped himself next to Vanitas on his bed.

“Ventus, I’m not exactly sociable, I doubt i’ll make an entertaining host.”

“You are sociable with me though, and in the end it’ll be us two and the ghosts-” Vanitas scoffed. “We would make a good ghost hunting duo.”

Ventus made a pouty face and while he might have the face of an angel the blonde knew exactly how to manipulate Vanitas into complying, he’d take it back, demons were real and his boyfriend was definitely one of them.

“Ughhh.” Vanitas threw an arm over his face dramatically, he heard Ventus exclaiming in victory and then dropping himself on the other. 

A wheeze of air was forced out from Vanitas when the boy landed with his entire weight on his chest “Fuck, Ven get off you’re heavy.” 

“Don’t be such a baby we both know I don’t weigh anything to you.” Like Vanitas said, he was dating a demon with the face of an angel.


	10. Growing Pains

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanitas 20 / Sora 22 / Xion 15 / Ventus 21

BooTube, a dumb name for a dumb youtube channel about ghost hunting. The channel has grown a lot in the past 2 years. Apparently the dynamic between Ventus and Vanitas in allegedly haunted places was well liked among several million of people as indicated by their subscriber count.

Ventus’ little show had expanded from just him to a semi professional show. He still went to college though, majoring in filmmaking.

Vanitas on the other hand didn’t even get accepted for Radiant Garden Community College. Instead he worked full time in his mom's flower shop. His mom was super excited about Vanitas taking over the family business, in fact she seemed to be the most happy about him getting the rejection letter. 

Working in the shop made him enough money to get a small apartment, situated in a nice place with a decent commute to both the shop and college. Ventus had gladly moved in with him, especially after a disaster in the boys dorm within the second month of Ven’s first year. It was nice to always be close to Ventus.

However sharing a small apartment had a few downsides.

Like when his essence would surge up and he had to hide whatever deformities tore through his skin from his human boyfriend who was very concerned for his health and wellbeing. They had been dating 5 years and he had yet to break the fact that “Oh hey by the way I’m an abomination that has existed since the dawn of time and have been stuck in this human body for almost 20 years.” Vanitas was pretty sure that was going to be a dealbreaker. He was too attached to this human to risk that.

Luckily, Ventus was at school today so Vanitas didn’t have to worry too much about the agonizing sounds he let escape. Although the neighbours might complain later.

Vanitas was writhing on the floor, he had closed the blinds the second he felt his migraine worsen, knowing what would follow. In the dark he could see the slight yellow glow his eyes radiated but that wasn’t exactly his main concern as his essence started to crawl under his skin. Vanitas felt both like he was trapped and like there was something foreign inside of him. Feeling both his essence desperately trying to claw out and his human body being torn apart was an agonizing experience that was hard to get used to.

His essence managed to tear through skin, he screamed, pressing his fist in his mouth to muffle it somewhat. Vanitas could feel something growing out of the torn skin and muscle. It would probably be another eye those were common, although his essence would sometimes grow another mouth and very rarely it would try to create more limbs. The tearing of his human flesh could be heard if he paid attention. At first it was sickening, but Vanitas has gotten numb to it, not like he was coherent enough to really process any of the sounds as he was drowned in pain.

Vanitas remembered when his casket was 6 and he had scarred his hand because he had been so angry he wasn’t regaining his power. Now he regretted ever wishing for his lost power as another scream was forced from his throat.

Eventually, his essence settled.

He managed to crawl to the bathroom and pull himself up to the mirror to see the damage.

The first thing he saw was the many yellow eyes scattered across his limbs, they never quite blinked in unison, some would always lag behind. Vanitas tried to focus and look through his two normal human eyes, even if they didn’t look very human right now. 

Next, he could see a lot of missing skin and only the muscle beneath it showing, seeing it move made his stomach(… stomachs?) churn. The skin around it was ashen black, he was sure it was trying to regrow and would immediately die off again with his essence still lingering on the surface, burning the skin.

Finally, Vanitas had a few extra mouths with sharp teeth that had some of his skin pulled between it and fully formed tongues hanging out and dripping saliva on the bathroom floor. No extra limbs this time lucky enough.

Vanitas crawled into the bathtub, fumbling to turn the spray on. The hot water hit his many eyes, but the short sting was barely registered. It gave some kind of relief and would help him calm down. Eventually, his essence would retreat and heal the damage it had done to the human body it inhabited.

This had been happening more frequently, Ventus had thought he was possessed the first time he was home to hear Vanitas in the bathroom. He had luckily managed to convince his boyfriend it was just the episodic migraines. But now Ventus was sure to notice sometime soon.

Vanitas wasn’t sure what he would do without Ventus. He had never truly cared for anything, not even himself, in all of his very long existence.

Some of the eyes on his arm blinked slowly as the mouth above it drooled over them.

He couldn’t lose Ventus to this.


	11. Whoops

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanitas 22 / Sora 24 / Xion 17 / Ventus 23

  


“Hey there spook squad, you’re watching BooTube.” Ventus greeted the camera with a little wave. Vanitas tried to suppress a fond smile, couldn’t have 1 million people know he had actual feelings. “Tonight we’ll be investigating the old Radiant Garden Church. We’ll be hoping to answer the question, is the supernatural real?”

  


Vanitas for his part did his famous shake of the head and exasperated look that the fans always ate up. Ventus continued on, explaining the history of the building behind them. “It was the first church built here in Radiant Garden but has been sitting cold and abandoned for many years now. The only people that come here now are teens looking for trouble, and according to some accounts, ghosts and demons. They say the veil between our world and theirs is thin here after the event that transpired here--.” Vanitas stopped listening at some point. He already knew all of this, they’d done the research on the church together. 

  


A sudden noise pulled him out his thoughts, immediately looking behind him, where the church sat peeking up slightly between the trees. Nothing.

  


“Vani?” He just as quickly snapped his head back to look at his boyfriend.

  


“Just thought I heard something.” 

  


Ventus had an insufferable grin on his face. “And here I thought you never got spooked.” he rolled his eyes, engaging in their banter, this was going to be a video after all. Still, he looked back at the church uneasy.

  


“Cool, that's a wrap for the intro. Let’s get to the church and film a few scenery shots before we go in.” Roxas said, already picking up the camera. Xion hummed not far from him, looking at their film notes. 

  


“That only took 2 takes, good job guys!” Ventus exclaimed, his beaming smile directed at Vanitas who just shrugged. They put the folding chairs they had been sitting on back in the car and the small filming crew made their way up to the church.

-0-

  


Vanitas had been uneasy ever since they stepped foot in the church. He could feel his essence swirling and pushing at the edges of its container, like it was trying to push itself out and get as far away from the church as possible. 

  


They weren’t alone in this church.

  


Now Vanitas wasn’t stupid, he himself was an eldritch creature of nightmares from another dimension and reality. Creatures described as demons were very likely real, in fact, it wasn’t a far stretch to assume they were eldritch beings in human vessels. If he ever came across one, it would be a fair assumption that Vanitas could easily tear it apart. 

  


It’s just that whatever presence he was feeling here was overwhelming pressing on him from all angles, it was suffocating. Even worse.

  


The feeling felt familiar.

  


Vanitas turned the corner into a long hallway. At the end he could see a person. Benefits of having night vision thanks to eldritch demon eyes. Now he was sure it wasn’t Ventus, Roxas or Xion. He was currently doing a ‘solo walk’ and his timer had only just started as he left his friend behind at the entrance of the church. 

  


It could also definitely not be some weird teenager, confirmed when Vanitas saw the person's limbs bend in an awkward angle as it was trying to speed towards him like some horror movie ghost child.

  


His essence protested the closer the creature got, he could feel the migraine as it almost felt like his essence was ramming into his chest and pushing his body backwards. 

  


The thing stumbled and fell over, as it started to crawl it began moaning. It almost reminded him of a child that didn’t know how to speak, but with a less cute voice.

  


Vanitas his body finally did what his essence had been begging for them to do as he slowly stumbled back, too scared to turn his back to the thing. 

  


Too bad his essence was acting up too much as he felt his skin snap. 

  


The sudden pain made him lose his balance as he fell backwards. Quickly he tried to get back up as the thing seemed to gain speed. It was a battle he would lose. The thing managed to get a hold on his ankle. 

  


Vanitas screamed.

  


Its face was melting, too many eyes, too many mouths and with his essence touching the creature directly, he finally realized what he was looking at.

  


The Hunter.

  


Petrified he stared in horror as one of its mouths on its arm opened and a long tongue rolled out to lick at his leg. As it tried to move its molten face closer, one of its eyes rolled out of its socket as it bit down right next to the mangled and molten hand with a vice grip on his ankle.

  


Another scream rang through the hallway. He thought it was his own, until a foot met the Hunters quickly decaying face. Vanitas got pulled up by Roxas while he stared in awe at his boyfriend kicking the living shit out of the Hunter. Not a hard feat as the human vessel it inhabited seemed to have been liquefying from the immense pressure inside of it.

  


With the Hunter gone for now, Vanitas felt like he could breathe again.

  


“What the fuck was that!?” Ventus screamed, trying to wipe the human goo from his shoes. 

  


“Kinda looked like a fucking zombie.” Roxas said as he stared in disbelief at the puddle. 

  


“Demon possession gone wrong?” Xion sounded small and shaken.

  


Vanitas went to answer all of them but was hit with a migraine wave as he felt his essence pushing and pulling from all angles, still scared and trying to flee it’s container. He knew what was coming and it was happening right in front of the people he would hope to never scare away.

  


They screamed.

  


They probably thought he was being possessed by whatever just attacked him. Vanitas couldn’t blame them.

  


Writhing on the ground, probably having ‘holy’ water sprayed on him as his essence screamed in terror and pain. This was probably the worst it had ever been. He could feel several limbs trying to grow from various places on his chest and back, the many mouths screaming along with his own. 

  


When it settled, he struggled to look up being met with the horrified face of Ventus.


	12. Whoops (Continued)

They had tied him up to a pillar as the love of his life, his little sister, and Roxas were discussing with hushed tones a few feet away. 

Vanitas could slowly feel his essence retreating, the three had looked in horrified fascination at first when his limbs started being slowly pushed back into his body as new skin grew over the holes that were left. They had turned their backs and glanced at him every once in a while.

He was tired, growing new limbs and then having to re-heal took a lot out of him to begin with. Not to mention the terrifying encounter before that.

The Hunter had found him, he was destined to die in its stomach.

Several sets of footsteps shook him out of his sleepy daze. It seemed they had come to a decision on what to do with their little monster problem. At least they weren’t filming it.

“Vani?” Ventus crouched close to him, he looked so scared.

“Hey.” Wow his voice sounded so groggy as if he had just woken up. 

“If it’s really you in there please tell me something only Vani would know.” 

Vanitas blinked a few times. “You have a really weird and frankly gross birthmark on your thigh, it’s kinda a turn off when I’m suc-.” 

“OK!” Ventus cut him off.

“Yikes, tmi, this is definitely your bastard Ven.” Xion punched Roxas after he said that, he was so proud of his sister.

“Vanitas… can you explain what just happened?”

He took a deep breath. Here it comes.

“The short version is eldritch beings are real, I’m one of them and have been piloting this body since it was born.”

“What the fuck.” Roxas threw his hands up as he started pacing.

“The being attacking me is the Hunter, it tried to kill me and I escaped it fleeing to this dimension.” He paused, looking at his exposed skin on his leg as the skin knitted itself together. “I thought I was safe but it has caught my scent.”

Silence befell the three humans, they looked at each other all unsure of what to make of this situation. Ventus inched closer, kneeling down next to Vanitas. “How much of you is… the real you?” 

“All of it, whatever mind this body had before birth I crushed when I came to this dimension.” Vanitas made a face as he thought for a second. “Well the body isn’t technically mine, I didn’t make it, but I own it if that counts.”

Ventus looked… it was a mix of emotions that Vanitas couldn’t place. The blonde glanced back at the others. He squeezed Vanitas’ hand softly before huddling up with Roxas and Xion as they discussed what to do.

There was disbelief, of course. But they seemed to be pretty cool with it. In fact, Vanitas could swear he heard Ventus say something along the lines of “that’s hot.” while staring at one of the slowly disappearing mouths in his neck.

Xion was the first to address him after their discussion. “Okay, so to get things straight, my brother is an ancient and incomprehensible being from another dimension or reality.” She waved generally at all of him.

“Yea, pretty much.” Vanitas replied

“Fucking awesome.”

“Okay but if you’re some wacky being from another dimension why don’t you believe in ghosts!?” Ventus kicked him in the leg.

“Humans barely have any essence, you can’t live outside of your human container.” he shrugged. “Honestly should’ve thought about that before all of you evolved to have a shell around yourself.”    
  


His boyfriend gaped at him. “Are you implying older humans were basically ghosts?” 

“Fuck if I know, I just know in my dimension we just decided not to have physical bodies, way more convenient.”

Roxas sighed deeply from behind him while untying the ropes that had kept Vanitas captive. “This is fucking absurd let’s just go home, I need a long fucking nap.”

“Okay but what about the really powerful ancient being that just tried to eat Vanitas?” The only person with a brain cell, Ventus, asked.

“The Hunter has a gigantic amount of essence, any vessel he will take will die from the pressure.” It was logical, even if Vanitas still had a lingering feeling of fear churning around in his stomach.

Xion was pacing around. “What if it inhabits a baby?” 

“Liquid baby, right?” Roxas shrugged.

Vanitas got up with the help of Ven, dusting his pants. His ankle hurt from the Hunter biting him so he leaned on his boyfriend. “Likely, even if it manages to do so, the Hunter will have to grow up like any human so that won’t be a problem for at least 5 years when the body learns how to hold things and bite.” He replied to Roxas. Ventus looked at him concerned.

“Let’s just be careful ok.”


	13. Awkward

The next few days were….awkward. 

Ventus wasn’t sure how to act around him anymore, they danced around the issue at first, ignoring the elephant in the room, namely, Vanitas himself. 

They were forced to talk about it more when Vanitas had an episode right in the living room. It was more violent than his other outbursts. Ventus had managed to help keep the noise down by finding something for him to bite on as he screamed. 

Healing took hours.

Ventus wrapped him in a blanket and helped him swallow painkillers. As they waited for Vanitas’ body to sort itself out they talked. Vanitas told him everything.

He told him what he was, why he was in this dimension and that he was running, how he has been living in this human body since it’s birth, how he originally planned to ditch this place once he got strong enough but got too attached to the people around him. How his soul and essence had sometimes been fighting and altering his human body and the creature that had attacked him was the being that he has been running away from. 

Explained that all his medical conditions were the human body coping with the growing soul within it.

Ventus had grabbed his laptop shortly after.

“What are you doing.” Vanitas groaned from his pool of blankets and warmth.

“The hunter, I was wondering if this was his very first time in a body, he must have been looking for you.” His boyfriend frowned at the screen that was angled in a way that he couldn’t see what the other was doing. 

“So?”

“Well there must be reports of humans melting in public.” 

That… was actually a good idea.

With some effort and grunts Vanitas managed to crawl himself and his blankets next to Ventus, not trusting his body to sit up by itself he leaned on the blonde, looking over his shoulder.

“We should be on alert, if he’s going to try to follow you to finish the job we need to make sure you aren’t out and about alone too often, or at all.” Ventus typed furiously as he opened tab after tab for his research. Stopping for a few seconds to tab his finger on his chin in thought. “You should probably carry something like a bat or a knife to protect yourself.”

“A knife won’t kill it.”

“Not forever, but in a human body he has to adhere to human rules, just like you can feel things and get hurt so should he.”

Ventus had a point, and while Vanitas was glad that his boyfriend wasn’t scared to death of what he was, the eldritch creature had his doubts about hunting the hunter before it could find him.

But Ventus’ optimism was contagious.

If he believed they could fight back, then Vanitas could try.


End file.
